


I'll Be (Good To You)

by ishipallthings



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Different First Meeting, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/F, F/M, Falling In Love, Fluff and Angst, Friends to Lovers, Getting Together, Getting to Know Each Other, Howard Stark's A+ Parenting, Love Confessions, M/M, Minor Pepper Potts/Tony Stark, Mutual Pining, Nightmares, Pining, Pining Steve Rogers, Soulmate AU where what you write on your skin shows up on your soulmate's, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, Soulmates, Steve Feels, Steve Rogers Needs a Hug, Steve Rogers and the 21st Century, Team Bonding, Team as Family, Tony Feels, Tony Stark is Steve Rogers' Guide to the 21st Century
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-17
Updated: 2018-07-17
Packaged: 2019-06-06 04:31:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,838
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15186842
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ishipallthings/pseuds/ishipallthings
Summary: Steve Rogers wakes up seventy years out of time to a new world and a soulmate. It’s an adjustment.What he doesn’t expect is Tony Stark, a brilliant futurist who is equal parts fascinating and frustrating, and has just as many demons as Steve. He also doesn’t expect to find a family with a ragtag team of superheroes, or to fall in love.Luckily, Steve is nothing if not adaptable.





	I'll Be (Good To You)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [royal_chandler](https://archiveofourown.org/users/royal_chandler/gifts).



> So, for this fic I took royal_chandler’s amazing prompt for pining Steve, combined it with a soulmate AU, and ran with it. The end result is a soulmate AU that isn’t really about soulmates but more about Steve finding a home and a family with the Avengers. I got a chance to write an alternate first meeting between Steve and Tony, which I’ve wanted to do for ages. This fic is three times longer than my original estimate, and it’s both angstier and sappier than what I thought it would be. Opps?
> 
> This is my first proper Steve/Tony fic, so it’s kind of a love letter to this ship, and to Steve as well.
> 
> I couldn’t resist including Jan in this fic, but her backstory isn’t MCU-compliant. And I needed a villain, so I picked Doom. 
> 
> The handwriting soulmate AU aspect of this fic was inspired by two wonderful fics - [Handwriting](http://lightshadowverisimilitude.tumblr.com/post/158211236105/handwriting-22) by lightshadowverisimilitude and [Beloved](https://archiveofourown.org/works/12889131) by thecitylightshow.
> 
> A million thanks to erde, captainstarkreportingforduty, thecitylightshow and lazywriter7 for cheer-reading and beta help, and all my love to xtaticpearl, kiernaserea, and wormdelivre for cheerleading and talking me down from multiple freakouts. I have the most amazing friends. 
> 
> Thanks again to royal_chandler for the great prompt, all your prompts were wonderful. I hope the fic isn’t too much of a disappointment! Thank you to the SLS mods for running this event, and being really understanding and helpful. 
> 
> Title is taken from Calum Scott’s Good To You, a song that I think is a perfect fit for the fic.

* * *

 

Some nights, when Steve dreams of driving the plane into the ice, it's more like slipping into a memory, crystal-sharp and familiar. Most nights, he's caught in a loop, a loop of the jagged pain in his throat when he realised that there was no other way, saying goodbye to Peggy over the radio, wondering what their dance would have been like, how it would have felt with the right partner. The feeling of relief that at least he wouldn't have to say goodbye to Bucky, the way his stomach dropped at the thought of his best friend, even as the plane moved faster towards the water.

He remembers thinking of his soulmate last, an old what-if, not forgotten, but more easily pushed aside by the reality of his choices and his life than he would have once imagined. Not meeting his soulmate wasn't a regret, but it had been another question he would never get a chance to answer. He had felt almost wistful for a moment. Then the water and ice had closed over him, and when he woke next, seventy years had passed.

 

* * *

 

Steve wakes in a cold sweat, blindly reaching for the light switch beside his nightstand. Soft light floods the room as he keeps his eyes closed. He tries to steady his breathing, the repetitive rise and fall of his chest taking up his focus as he blocks out the lingering traces of his nightmare. The light is something close to a comfort when he finally does open his eyes, a direct and visual contrast to the darkness that rears inside his head whenever he needs to get some sleep, reminding him that he's more than just a series of fractured memories and heavy losses. Even if he doesn't quite believe it.

Steve props his pillow up against the headboard and sits up, brushing a hand through his sweat-damp hair. The sky is still dark through the small window in his room, meaning that he's only managed two hours of sleep at best. He could head down to one of the gyms on SHIELD'S basement level and destroy a few punching bags, but he's spent a fair amount of his time doing that for the past few days, and the idea of more of it leaves a sour taste in his mouth. Day after day, left up to his own devices with a SHIELD agent checking up on him every so often to make sure he hasn't gone insane, tucked away until they need him. A soldier, rescued in peacetime. It's not exactly a life he wants, or one worth living.

He turns to his nightstand and reaches for the book at the top of the pile, a paper bookmark nestled almost half-way through the pages of _The Hobbit_ , a well-worn comfort read he read more than once before the ice. They didn't really have money for books when he was growing up, but there was a small library a few blocks down the street from the room he and his Ma shared. He visited often, losing himself in fantasy worlds and historical battles, in words that made him feel strong even when his body shook with the force of his cough on cold nights, and most people either laughed at him or didn't even see him. The dust from the books certainly didn't help his asthma or the coughs, but Steve still made the trip there at least once a week, determined to keep the home he had made for himself out of words and paper. The visits trailed off after his Ma got sick and the war came, but he's never forgotten. In this strange new world he's woken up to, the written word is a sanctuary.

It is also a way for Steve to catch up on everything he's missed over the past seven decades as he slowly makes his way through years of history. Much of what he reads makes him wonder if humanity is ever going to learn from its losses and mistakes, but not everything is so discouraging.

As Steve turns the page, he catches sight of a series of numbers scrawled on the outside of his right arm, like something out of a complicated equation. He bites his lip and turns back to his book, expecting the writing to fade away like the many scribbles that have covered his skin since he's woken up, from a long and indecipherable equation on the outside of his left arm to a hastily written _"no strawberries"_ in block letters on the outside of his right hand. It had been a serious shock when he first woke up to faint words and marks over his skin. Unlike most soul-words, Steve's marks faded away quickly, even overlapping at times. The doctors at SHIELD who examined him had been fascinated. His case was one of unique circumstances, to say the least, and after lengthy debate, they theorized that perhaps Steve's marks were working on a time-delay, making up for the years he had spent frozen in the ice, believing that he died without a soulmate.

Steve had barely paid attention to their palpable excitement; he was too busy wrestling with this new revelation in this strange world he had woken up to. He had a soulmate now.

He had dreamt of his soulmate as a boy, his arms often covered with eager black scrawls, waiting for a reply. That had only ended in disappointment and the bitter thought that once again, he was not enough. Too weak and scrawny, so that when he tried to stand his ground and fight back people just laughed in his face, so that even his soulmate didn't want him. The last time Steve had written to his soulmate was the night of his Ma's funeral, curled up on a bare mattress and feeling so cold and alone he thought he would never feel warm again.

And now the ground beneath his feet is shifting once again. Steve's soulmate is of the future, now his future, while he is a relic no one has any idea how to handle, least of all himself.

His soulmate deserves more than someone who does not know how to be little more than a ghost. Besides, with his marks fading as quickly as they appear, there is no guarantee that he'll get a response even if he tries to write back.

Just as Steve is finishing the chapter, a line of writing materializes on his left arm, black and solid. It does not vanish like the rest of his soulmarks have, even when Steve puts his index finger on it and rubs at his skin. Words from his soulmate, in real-time.

_D. needs an upgrade._

 

* * *

 

According to JARVIS, the words from his soulmate appear on the underside of his left arm at approximately 1:15 AM. Tony is too busy pouring over adjustments to the Mark VII before he takes it out for a test flight sometime in the next weeks to notice for a few hours. Over the years, he has gotten used to writing on his skin, leaving himself notes on ideas and reminders of things to do, words no one else will ever be able to see on their skin. He knows he doesn't have a soulmate, and that's fine.

Howard had clearly agreed. The one and only time he had discussed the topic of soulmates with his father, Tony had been eight years old, and Howard had caught him writing on the inside of his right palm, a message in a bottle to someone who never existed. The sight of it had sparked something ugly in Howard, who stalked towards Tony, tossing out barbs about him and his useless daydreams, laughing sardonically at the idea that he really thought that there was someone for him.

"Do you think the world is that kind, boy? You better learn." And he had, in the end. Howard had made sure of that, and Obie had given him one hell of a refresher course.

Despite this, Tony has gotten into a habit of writing to himself on his skin, and it's a habit he finds soothing. Sure, he has JARVIS, and more times than not he'll toss out new ideas to his AI instead of going to the trouble of finding a pen to write on himself with, but he does like writing down equations and quick reminders about his work whenever possible and convenient. Numbers have always been a source of excitement as well as comfort for Tony, especially after Afghanistan and his focus on the armour. Seeing the equations change and grow remind him of how much work he has put into trying to make up for his mistakes, and how far he still has to go.

His mother had never mentioned a soulmate. Once, Tony had caught her in the piano room, tracing a message on her wrist and crying. She always made sure to wear long-sleeves after that.

His last scribble is apparently from the night before, a messy reminder to give DUM-E a proper upgrade before heading over to the cot in the workshop and passing out for a few hours. Pepper is in California, taking care of some SI business, and he hadn't bothered going up to the bedroom. He only remembers this at JARVIS' prompting, afterwards.

Tony is the middle of stretching his arms above his head for a quick rest, bending his elbows back when he first sees the words. The words from his soulmate.

The first thought that pops into his head is that they are his words, but that isn't his handwriting. His heart races in his chest, and he suddenly finds it hard to swallow. He has not read the words yet, and he keeps his gaze averted as if they might go away on their own if he pretends hard enough.

It doesn't work.

Tony leans his forehead on the surface of his workshop table, trying and failing to keep calm. This has to be a joke, some kind of hilarious trick the universe is playing him on him. "A little too late for laughing," he thinks and lets out a sigh.

"JARVIS, when did -"

"Approximately three hours ago, sir." Okay, confirmation from JARVIS means he isn't hallucinating, even though that might be the better option right now. Great.

Resigned, Tony lifts his head and moves his arm closer, peering at the words. It's not like knowing what his soulmate wrote is going to make this any less real, and it might help him get a better grasp on whatever the hell is going on.

_Are you there?_

Tony is wrong. He isn't ready.

The words hit like a body blow, a sensation that Tony has grown almost accustomed to over the past few years, but it still leaves him staggering. His hands shake, and he actually really wants a drink right now.

Give him numbers, give him tech, but he is speechless in the face of these three little words.

Tony has believed his entire life that he is one of those people who does not have a soulmate, and despite what people might think, he has made his peace with that. He knows he needs too much from people, no matter how hard he tries to rein it in. He loves too hard, fast and all-consuming, and he deals with that by putting people at arm's length, wielding the mask of Tony Stark, billionaire playboy philanthropist, a mask people seemed to either adore or hate. There are a few exceptions, of course - Rhodey and Pepper made it past his defences, but that only means that they are more in danger to be hurt by him than anyone else, with his selfishness and carelessness and talent at going for the jugular when needed. Adding a soulmate to the list would mean another person he would end up ruining eventually, not to mention another source of pain for Pepper.

Pepper, who is wonderful and understands Tony as much as anyone can, who puts up with his shit, and whom he is happy with, even though the voice in his head that says good things never last and that he'll fuck up without meaning to has been growing louder in the past weeks They've hit a bit of a rough patch recently; with their conflicting schedules they've barely had time to see each other for weeks, and Tony knows Pepper is still uncertain about his work on the armour. She had wanted him to take a step back Tony had tried to stay away, for her, but in the end, he had broken his promise. He is Iron Man. This won't change, even if he wanted it to.

Him being Iron Man is yet another reason why reaching out to his soulmate is a terrible idea. If he finds them, eventually they would become a liability, a weakness to be used against him. He has already failed in protecting so many people, starting with Yinsen and ending with Pepper, and the idea of failing again with his soulmate makes his stomach roll over. He can't risk that.

Underneath all that, Tony acknowledges a growing pit of hurt and bitterness opening up within him. He is forty-three years old, and this is the first time he has ever gotten words from his soulmate. He doesn't know how old his soulmate is; they could be a kid or someone a lot younger than him. According to recent reports, platonic soulmates make up a decent quarter of all soulbonds.

There is also the possibility that they're around the same age as Tony, that they've always been there, on the other side of the bond. The thought of showing the most intimate parts of himself to his soulmate in his messages, how he thinks, how his brain works, while they've been ignoring him for so long is almost unbearable. Tony's heart clenches in his chest, his fingers unconsciously tapping out a rhythm on the arc reactor.

 _You left me alone_ , he thinks furiously, before pushing the thought away quickly. Tony may need a lot of people, but he has more than proven that he can get along just fine without a soulmate, and there is no reason that should change now. They're better off without him, and he's got things handled.

He turns back to the schematics of the armour and does not look at the words for the rest of the night.

 

* * *

 

Steve meets Tony Stark for the first time three days after his first message to his soulmate.

He had sat there for a long time afterwards, the question at the forefront of his mind. _Are you there?_ He almost added _sorry I'm late_ , but that seemed too much like self-pity and probably wouldn't make sense without context and a lengthy explanation anyway.

He is not surprised when he doesn't receive a response. After all, he's been in the ice for seventy years, and his soulmate, if they're even still alive, could have spent decades without him, built an entire life that Steve has no place in, just as he seems to have no place in this new century. Steve can't say he isn't a little disappointed, but in the grand scheme of things, he's dealt with a lot worse. He probably wouldn't even know what to say to his soulmate if they did meet.

Just like he has no idea what to say to his impending visitor. Steve had been more than a little taken aback when Fury had first mentioned that Howard's son wanted to visit if he was open to it. He and Howard had been friends, sure, but they were never really that close. Sometimes it had felt like Howard had admired him as Captain America without ever really seeing him as Steve, and it had rankled.

His own reservations aside, from what Fury had told him, Howard had invested a lot of his own time and money into funding expeditions to look for Steve, and now that his son had come looking for an audience with him, it didn't seem right to turn him down.

 

* * *

 

Fury offers to give him SHIELD's files on Tony before arranging their meeting. Steve accepts, hoping that it will give him a place to start, especially since Fury has been dropping hints of a team initiative, and as Tony Stark is Iron Man, there's a distinct possibility Steve would be working with him in the field before long.

The files are long and complicated, and yet, after making his way through them, Steve still feels unsure, as if he has been given the impression of Tony Stark, rather than whom the man really is. He even goes through the video footage they've given him, of the press conference Tony had held after coming home from capture in Afghanistan. Steve watches Tony make his declaration to the world: _I am Iron Man_ , and he thinks of how he felt after stepping out of the vita chamber, remade with the serum, and the moment Howard had given him the shield. It felt like the only choice he could have made.

He watches the more recent footage as well, of Tony drunk at his birthday party, very nearly causing a riot, and wonders at the difference between the two men he'd seen in the clips, two very different Tony Starks. It's not until he remembers the mention of palladium poisoning from the files that some of the pieces start to fall in place.

Still, they don't quite fit, and Steve is left with a barely filled in picture of a man who seems to embody contradiction. He does not know how much of Tony Stark in these files is a performance, and how much is real. Steve decides he's better off meeting the man before rushing to judgment, especially since it was Tony who reached out for a visit.

A knock interrupts Steve's thoughts, and he moves off the bed to stand near the door. His room is bare except for the essentials, and he feels a little strange about meeting with Tony here, but the idea of suggesting a meeting outside of SHIELD had felt even stranger. He's been outside SHIELD of course, but never for long, and usually with a SHIELD agent by his side. It always feels like he's being babysat, and while he chafes at the thought, he does realize that there is no protocol for "super-soldier found alive frozen in ice", and that they are doing the best they can. He can't blame them for being cautious with him.

Steve smooths out his light blue button-down before reaching for the door handle and pulling the door open. He takes in the sight of Tony Stark, dressed in a light grey three-piece suit and wearing dark sunglasses. He's a handsome man, even more striking in person than in photos or video footage. A sharp, sudden pinprick of anxiety hits Steve. He's always known that his appreciation for the male form stretches beyond artistic appreciation, but he had been too busy to dwell on it much before the serum, and after meeting Peggy, he had put it out of his mind. This is the first time he has felt that spark of acknowledgment, of interest, since coming out of the ice, and it leaves him feeling wrong-footed and clumsy.

After a beat, Steve moves his gaze away from Tony, hoping fervently that his staring had not been too obvious. He steps back, noting a smirk on Tony's face before reaching his hand out towards the man.

"You must be -"

He accepts, clasping Steve's hand in his for one warm moment before letting go, stepping in through the door and filling in the rest of Steve's sentence. "Tony Stark, yeah."

His smirk drops a little then, and Tony pushes at the frame of his sunglasses. "And you're Cap." The statement seems to end on a disbelieving note, and Steve gives an inward sigh. Of course. He must be a Cap fanboy. Fury had filled him in on Captain America's popularity and the commercialization of his role, and all it had done was make Steve feel baffled and more lost than ever.

No wonder Tony had asked for a visit. In his eyes, this was a once-in-a-lifetime chance to meet a childhood hero.

Steve's throat closes. Another person to only see him as Captain America, to forget about Steve Rogers. There seems to be a never-ending line of them, these days.

Tony seems to have realized he's said the wrong thing if the way he's frowning is any indication. There is silence for a moment before Steve shrugs and tries for a forced smile. "Steve Rogers, yeah."

Tony straightens and pulls off his sunglasses in one sudden move. Steve is met with a pair of warm, brown eyes, filled with something close to apology. "Yeah sorry, you must be getting sick of the whole Cap shtick, aren't you? A real boy under there and all." He waves a hand in Steve's general direction, giving a quick laugh.

"Hard not to think of you as Cap, after everything..." Tony bites off the rest of the sentence, looking somewhat caught off-guard before trailing off into silence. Steve senses there is a lot more to that, but he's not here for an interrogation. He decides the smart thing to do is not to push, at least not right now.

"Yeah, actually. It gets pretty tiring after a while when it's all you hear." Steve shrugs, running a hand through his hair. "They gave it to me at first mostly for propaganda purposes. Took me a while to get used to it."

He is still getting used to it, sometimes. People say the name Captain America like it's something bigger than him, something better. They look up to Captain America, and end up looking past Steve Rogers.

When Steve looks up, Tony's face is slack with surprise, as if he was expecting a different answer. Steve wonders if he has said too much. Before he can change the subject, Tony's face brightens with a smile, one that seems almost practiced but looks softer around the edges, and he holds out a hand in Steve's direction.

"Alright, let's start over." He wiggles his proffered hand at Steve, who takes it, bemused. "Pleased to meet you, Steve Rogers. I'm Tony." Steve feels himself give a quiet laugh, unbidden, and Tony's smile sparks in response.

"It's a pleasure, Tony."

 

* * *

 

They don't end up hanging around Steve's room for long, as Tony extends an invitation to show him around for the afternoon that Steve gladly accepts. It'll be nice to get out from under the supervision of the SHIELD agents, for a while, and Tony seems like he's someone who knows what he's doing.

They head to a quiet Italian restaurant for a late lunch, as Tony said he hadn't eaten because of a long meeting. There are only a few patrons around, courtesy of the later hour, and no one gives them more than a cursory glance, which Steve appreciates. He knows that SHIELD's discovery of him in the ice has not yet become public knowledge, but he can't help feeling a little paranoid, and he knows Tony is a busy public figure as well.

Tony's discomfort seems to have worn off after their initial introduction, and even if Steve is still trying to figure out what separates Tony Stark in the public eye and the media from Tony as a person, he finds himself enjoying their conversation. He notes that the topic of Howard has yet to come up, and decides to revaluate his assumptions about Tony's reasons for a visit at a later date.

Tony's a fast talker, jumping from topic to topic with practiced ease, clearly comfortable in his own intelligence, while also welcoming Steve's input, though Steve guesses that this is a man who doesn't suffer fools gladly. They jump from subject to subject before Steve asks Tony about the Iron Man armour, and although he doesn't understand a lot of Tony's explanations at first, Tony is surprisingly patient with Steve's many questions, and his drive and passion are compelling. This is a man made for the time he was born in, one of unbelievable technology and creation. It's nice that someone has that, even while Steve himself feels like he doesn't belong in any time, removed from the equation.

Later, Steve finds himself telling Tony about his habit of sketching, before the ice, when Tony asks what Steve's been up to since he's been defrosted. He hasn't been drawing since he woke up from the ice, too afraid that if he puts pen to paper to capture the world around him, the reality of it will become inescapable. The idea of it still brings him comfort, albeit a distant one, and somehow the subject of art leads to Tony's suggestion of a museum trip on another day.

They part ways after lunch. Tony insists on paying while Steve quietly shoves a twenty-dollar bill under Tony's credit card when he isn't looking. Steve doesn't know if Tony's offer of another meet-up is actually going to happen, but it has certainly been an interesting day, a welcome change from the monotony he has gotten used to since the ice.

 

* * *

 

To Steve's surprise, he and Tony do end up meeting again over the next few weeks, regularly in fact. Tony seems to have taken the idea of being Steve's guide to New York in the 21st century, and the 21st century in general to heart. Although it's still mostly Tony giving suggestions at this point, from a baseball game to visiting Coney Island, Steve doesn't mind - it feels nice to have someone else take the reins for a bit, and with Tony by his side as he slowly explores what this new world has to offer, Steve feels just a little less alone.

One time, Tony takes Steve to a quaint little diner on the outskirts of Brooklyn, "Maria's". It's a little different to what Steve thinks of when he pictures a diner, with its white and red chequered floor pattern and the green plastic booths, but the atmosphere is comfortable and the wall-mounted jukebox in the corner is familiar. Steve falls a little bit in love.

Conversation flows easily between them during the meal, with most of the time being taken up by Tony explaining to Steve what Stark Industries has been trying to accomplish with their clean energy programme. Steve finds so much of what they can do now with technology to be fascinating, and Tony is more than happy to satisfy his curiosity, while at the same time reigniting it, especially when they start discussing Tony's newest ideas. The afternoon passes in the blink of an eye.

The next time Steve brings up Stark Industries during a lunch with Tony, this time at a restaurant serving Japanese cuisine, as Tony is insistent about Steve trying various types of food from different countries, the day ends in a spontaneous tour of Stark Tower and Tony's workshop.

"Steve, are you trying to give DUM-E a handshake?"

"... no?"

"That's adorable, Rogers."

"It's what you do during an introduction, Tony!"

At the end of one of their meet-ups, Tony gives Steve a lazy salute in farewell, calling over his shoulder "see you, Cap!" The light note in his voice tells Steve he's teasing, but not in a way where he's laughing at Steve, but trying to get Steve to laugh with him. Something tight uncurls in Steve's chest at the thought, and he smiles.

Tony Stark, his first friend in the 21st century. Who would have thought?

 

* * *

 

Steve doesn't expect Fury to call Tony in to deal with this Loki debacle, but he can't exactly say he's surprised when he hears the burst of loud music over his comms and Tony's familiar drawl. _Agent Romanoff, did you miss me?_ Mostly, he's relieved.

Tony hits Loki with a blast from his repulsors, sending the god sprawling on the ground before he lands next to Steve in the armour. This is the first time he's seen the armour in flight, Tony a golden-red blur against the sky. He had gotten a quick glimpse of the schematics for the latest version of the armour during his tour of Stark Tower, but he has never seen it up close, and the sight of it is stunning.

Not for the first time, Steve marvels at the idea of Iron Man's creation, first as a way of escape for Tony in Afghanistan, before becoming a way for Tony to do good and protect people, to make up for his past mistakes. Tony hasn't mentioned much of his life before Iron Man in their conversations, but from what he knows of Tony's file, and what he is slowly starting to see, he knows that those mistakes must weigh heavy on Tony's shoulders.

He nods to Tony in acknowledgment, lips almost forming his name before he catches himself.

"Iron Man."

"Captain." Tony lifts the faceplate and sends Steve a quick grin. "Fancy seeing you here. Now, what are we gonna do with this diva?"

 

* * *

 

Steve doesn't remember much of his fight with Tony on the helicarrier. All that he recalls later are glimpses: _You always have to be the smartest guy in the room, don't you? Trying so hard to make up for your mistakes, to play at being a hero, when you know it'll never be enough._

_And what about you, Cap? Taking on the role of the long-lost knight, so good at following orders, too afraid to step down from the pedestal they’ve erected for you because then you’ll have to face the fact that you’ve lost everyone you love. You’re just a living ghost._

The force of the explosion is what finally clears the angry fog from his mind. He and Tony hit the floor hard. As the smoke clears, Steve looks up at Tony, realization and apology crashing into him with equal force.

"Tony, I'm -"

Tony interrupts him in a strangled tone as he moves to get up. "Steve, we gotta suit up."

He ends up smacking into the wall with his right shoulder as he loses his balance momentarily. Steve reaches for him, holding on to Tony as they move down the hallway.

He swallows down the rush of protectiveness that comes over him, quickly scanning Tony's figure for any critical injuries. "You alright?" Tony gives a quick nod in response.

They split up when Tony goes off to collect the armour, and Steve doesn't look back at Tony, even if part of him wants to. They've got a job to do.

 

* * *

 

"We lost Coulson, but this isn't over, Tony. Loki's still coming for us."

"Fury's got the same blood on his hands that Loki does, we can't just go marching off on his orders."

"I agree, but our first priority right now is getting this done. He tried to tear us apart, he used the sceptre to make us turn on each other. We can't let him win."

"Divide and conquer was his strategy, sure, but there has to be more to it than that."

"Well, you said it yourself right? He's a diva - he wants to beat us, and he wants us to know we've been beaten. This guy isn't one for subtle victories."

"Exactly. He wants an audience for his final act. Flowers, parades, a monument in the skies with name plastered - son of a bitch."

 

* * *

 

Whether by a ridiculous stroke of luck or what someone else might call destiny, the team ends up working together pretty seamlessly, despite the fact some of them have known each other for less than a day, and a few are lacking proper introductions. Tony is beside him, telling him to "Call it, Cap." It's nothing like being with the Howling Commandos, seventy years too late and missing his brothers-in-arms, but it feels so good to have people who have his back in the field again, and Steve wonders if this will work, if one day he'll really feel like the Avengers are his team.

The sight of Tony, of Iron Man, flying straight for the wormhole with a missile, crushes the tentative almost-hope in Steve's chest with a steel fist. There is no other way - they need to close up the wormhole to stop more Chitauri from swarming New York, and they have to get rid of the nuke. He knows Tony is right.

"Tony -" There's nothing left to say here. Tony knows the risks, and he's willingly made his choice, just as Steve did when he drove the plane into the ice. Nothing left to say except - "thank you, Tony." _Thank you for being kind to me, even when you didn't have to. Thank you for making me smile. For being my friend._

"It's been an honour, Iron Man." The rest of the team is silent, and he can see Thor beside him, equally tense and focused on Tony, but he knows they share the sentiment.

There is a rustle on the comms and Tony's voice filters in as he travels further upwards into the sky.

"Someone's gotta save the world, right?" His voice is wry and gentle, and all of a sudden Steve feels like he's seventeen again, listening to the doctor tell Ma that there's nothing more to be done for her, like he's sitting in a darkened room mourning his best friend, wishing he could be blackout drunk. _It's not fair._

Most days, Steve's life feels like nothing more than a list of people he has lost. And now Tony, the first person who saw him as Steve Rogers in this new century, and not just a hero of the history books in the right uniform, is about to be added to the list. He knows Tony hasn't found his soulmate, but perhaps he'll spend his last moments wondering about them like Steve did.

In a moment, Tony's golden-red armour disappears from Steve's sight into the wormhole. There is a pause, and then suddenly all of the Chitauri are collapsing around them, without a single blow. Tony's done it. He's saved them.

They still have to close the portal, and time is running out, but they're all still frozen in place, watching the open portal for any sign of Tony.

"Come on, Stark." Steve makes out Agent Romanoff's fierce whisper over the comms and adds to her plea silently. _Come on, Tony._

But there's still no sign of him. Thor looks at Steve with a question in his eyes. Steve knows what he has to do. Swallowing hard, he manages to say the words, his voice sounding rough and scratchy to his own ears.

"Close it." He looks down at the ground, not wanting to see the portal close without Tony coming back to them.

Then he hears a sharp intake of breath over the comms and looks up instinctively, eyes immediately fixed on the armoured figure falling from the sky. Tony. "Thank god."

Tony is still falling, gaining speed in his descent, and Steve sees Thor gearing up to catch him before Hulk comes crashing in, seemingly out of nowhere, catching Tony against a building with one hand. They end up crashing hard, Hulk holding Tony before letting him drop to the ground.

Steve rushes over to Tony, Thor on his heels. The armour is damaged, with several pieces missing, but that's not what sends a frisson of fear up Steve's spine. The blue light of the arc reactor that powers the armour, that Steve knows from Tony's file also keeps a piece of shrapnel from entering his heart, is extinguished. Tony lies motionless before them, and the reality of it hits Steve. They got Tony back, but he's still gone.

Before the familiar greyness of grief begins to cloud his thoughts, a terrific roar from Hulk suddenly interrupts the heavy silence. Steve watches in relief, amazement and no little small amount of awe as Tony jerks awake, the arc reactor flickering back to life. Tony asks them what happened, his eyes searching for Steve's, who meets his frantic gaze with a smile.

"We won." Steve feels something warm and golden that resembles what he remembers of happiness settle in his bones.

They've won, and they're all still here.

 

* * *

 

Within three months after what the press and the world have dubbed the Battle of New York, the whole team has more or less relocated to the renamed Avengers Tower.

Steve and Bruce are the first to take Tony up on his offer. Steve had been growing sick of his room in the SHIELD barracks and was debating getting an apartment for himself in Brooklyn before Tony had brought up his offer, so the timing couldn't have been better. He figures having roommates with superhuman abilities is the closest thing he can find to shared life experience.

Bruce caves easily once Tony mentions the offer of his own private lab, but Steve suspects that, like himself, Bruce is feeling lonely, and he likes the idea of spending time with people who aren't so afraid of him because of the Hulk, even if the possibility makes him a little wary. Tony, in particular, Steve notes, is good for Bruce. His honesty and humour, although razor-sharp, helps Bruce relax a little, and in turn, Bruce's practiced calm curbs some of Tony's wilder impulses and ideas when it comes to experimentation.

Despite this, more often than not, especially during the first few weeks of their stay, Steve finds himself being regularly informed by JARVIS of yet another explosion in Tony's workshop. DUM-E, although enthusiastic, is generally very unhelpful with the fire extinguisher.

Clint is the next to join them, though Steve gets the feeling it's because he's doesn't want to stay at SHIELD after everything that's happened with Loki. Steve's been through a lot, but he can't imagine what it feels like to have someone take control of your mind and turn you against people who trust you. Steve's bumped into him on more than one occasion in the middle of the night, patrolling the common areas of the Tower, because nothing else quiets the noise inside his head. Nothing else drives away the nightmares. Steve's more than familiar with that.

Natasha is a less than frequent visitor, often spending weeks away on missions for SHIELD, but Steve knows she has her own floor that Tony drew up designs for, and she always has a quiet if careful smile for him whenever he sees her on his way up from the communal gym or passing through the kitchen.

Thor's appearances are similarly sporadic as he divides his time between Earth and Asgard, also often taking time off to spend with Dr. Foster, who Steve meets one weekend when she comes to New York for a visit. She's beautiful, incredibly smart, and Steve can easily see why Thor is head over heels for her. Watching them together makes him think of Peggy for one painful, wistful moment, and his thoughts also pause on his soulmate before drifting away. Steve is happy for them, even if a part of him wishes for someone who makes him smile like that, who he'll want to open his heart to, though that person won't be his soulmate. Jane and Thor are proof that people can find happiness beyond their soulbonds, as Thor has told them Asgardians don't have soulmates.

Tony, Bruce, and Jane hit it off, and end up getting along like a house on fire (both metaphorically and literally, given some of Tony's shenanigans), and Steve spends most of his time in the workshop that weekend, appreciating the front-row seat he's been given in observing some of the brightest scientific minds of this generation work together, even if this results in more hazardous explosions than one might imagine.

Three months in, and they're living together but aren't quite a team off the field. They know each other's patterns, sure, but they haven't really gotten the hang of working in sync with those patterns, and it's a rare day that finds all of them together in the same room for long. They split off in sections, Tony and Bruce spending the most time together in the workshop, often with Steve's company, while Clint and Natasha are rarely apart when she is in residence. Thor is friendly and cheerful with all of them, sometimes even heading down to the workshop to observe Tony's new tech for SI and start friendly debates (turns out Asgardian magic involves a lot of science), but Steve senses a lingering wariness between them as a group. Most of them are accustomed to working on their own, and unlearning that habit outside of sharing a living space and common interests is proving to be difficult.

This changes in the aftermath of their first big battle after the Chitauri attack, which of course involves saving the world again, this time from a mad scientist whose plan centers on releasing a horde of mind-controlled attack robots all over New York. He calls himself Metal Man, and Steve doesn't know who is more indignant about that name, Tony or Clint.

"I mean, really? If you're gonna become a super-villain, at least come up with something a little more creative."

"Not now, Hawkeye!"

"Hell yeah, even something like The Machine would be better."

"Really, Stark? That's all you got?"

"I'm just saying, that's how bad his choice is!"

"Can we please focus on the flying attack robots and save this for later?"

Later comes in the form of their post-battle meal, during which Clint and Tony spend a full hour coming up with increasingly inventive and ridiculous superhero names, with Thor as an enthusiastic third participant. They've all taken hits and they're all exhausted, and the takeout JARVIS has delivered really isn't anything special, but it's the first time they've really all spent time together off the field since the move to the Tower. It is almost as if fighting together has worn away some of their hesitance with each other, and there's a lightness between them now that hadn't been there before.

Weekly team dinners become a tradition after that, with each of the Avengers trading off to cook every week. Bruce has a preference for Indian food, and spicy curries, while Steve likes to experiment with different recipes but often comes back to classic comfort foods. Tony likes Italian, and he's the best baker out of all of them, even if he doesn't bake often. Once, when Steve's in the kitchen helping him slice apples for a pie, Tony confesses that it was his mother who first taught him to bake, and every time he does, he remembers her. The next time it's Steve's week, he finds a recipe for one-pot beef stew and thinks of his mother spooning more stew in his bowl, her smile both worried and loving. Thor tends to get creative in the kitchen, which leads some interesting meals, while Natasha likes taking someone else's recipe and adding her own twist to it for the week, and Clint always makes enough for leftovers, even though the team he's feeding includes as an Asgardian and a super-soldier.

It's slow but steady progress as they try and learn what being a team means outside of saving each other's lives and stopping super-villains. Their habits start to make room for one another; Natasha and Steve spar together in the gym when their schedules match up, and Thor tries out meditation with Bruce, taking a shine to it. Once, Steve watches Tony sparring with Natasha, and though he's no match for her, he's surprisingly good for someone who spends most of his time on the field encased in a suit of armour, moving much faster and landing quite a few more blows than Steve expects.

It's not perfect of course. Steve knows his teammates are hiding more scars than they'll allow themselves to show, and he's no exception, but there's something tying them together now, beyond working together when the world needs them to. It's not six pieces coming together to create something whole, but an affinity between them, similarity in broken places.

 

* * *

 

Not surprisingly, given the earlier start to their friendship, Steve finds that things are easiest for him with Tony. But Tony Stark is still Tony Stark, and easiest doesn't exactly mean easy. From the moment they met, Tony has been an enigma to Steve, and living together and become friends hasn't really changed that. He suspected from the beginning that being Tony Stark sometimes involves performance and pretence.

It isn't until he sees Tony at his most relaxed, absorbed in armour designs while AC/DC blares in the background, ignoring grease stains on his forehead and elbows, that he realizes just how deep that act goes. And even then, Tony's masks sometimes have masks of their own. He's a master at saying things he doesn't really mean, and he hides what he really cares about behind careful flippancy, like the way he brushes off Pepper's increased absence from the Tower when Thor brings the subject up one day with an excuse about SI business.

That night is the first time Steve finds Tony drinking in the workshop after JARVIS asks for his assistance, tipsy with bloodshot eyes that are hard to meet. There's a pen next to the empty bottle of whiskey, but as far as Steve can tell, Tony's skin is bare. He wonders if Tony was telling the truth when he said he didn't have a soulmate. Tony had mentioned it one of the times they had met for lunch before, a fact tossed out casually between bites as if it meant nothing, but maybe things weren't that simple.

He helps Tony to bed, finding a blanket to cover him with despite his murmured protests, and wishes love didn't have to hurt so much for Tony. His visit to the workshop the next day is spent mostly in silence, but Steve catches Tony sneaking looks at him as he sits there sketching. He doesn't bring up the elephant in the room, focusing instead on the sketch of Butterfingers and DUM-E he's been working on. Steve hands Tony the drawing before they head up to the kitchen for dinner, and the look that Tony sends him this time is half-grateful and half-puzzled as if expecting something else. Steve nudges Tony with his elbow, and the confusion slowly melts away to playful banter as they make their way up the stairs. Dinner is a quieter affair than usual, but Tony's smile is real, and Steve thinks he has solved another piece of the puzzle.

Tony's a hard one to figure out, but Steve thinks he'll be worth the effort.

 

* * *

 

Steve has adjusted quickly to many things in this new century, and some things he's even happy about, advances in medicine and the fight for equality, (he also appreciates microwaves very much), but one thing he finds himself feeling increasingly uncomfortable about is being a public figure as Captain America and co-leader of the Avengers. Notoriety isn't something new to him, not after the serum, but it was different before. Maintaining privacy is difficult for the team, with gossip sites debating every little detail of their lives and pictures of them being splashed across magazines every day. The way the press switches between praising and vilifying his team depending on the outcomes of their battles is what angers Steve the most, and he's learned the hard way to be more than wary of reporters and interviews.

He's dreading the Avengers' first televised interview as a group, but SHIELD is insistent, and they've put it off as long as they can. They send over a group of staff to help Steve get ready and pick out the right look - he tries on a series of different outfits before he's carted off to the studio for prep and makeup. He feels a little bit like a trained monkey by the end of it, and he's more than ready to get the whole experience over with.

Once they are satisfied with how he looks, dressed in a dark blue suit and slacks, formal but not so much that it's off-putting, he's directed to the waiting area. Bruce is already there, clad in a red dress shirt and a grey blazer. He shoots Steve a smile when he walks into the room, which morphs into a small smirk. "I just told them no green and no suits."

Steve huffs a quiet laugh. "And they listened?" He knows Bruce is equally nervous about this interview as he is, if not more so, and goes to fix a cup of tea for him, which usually helps calm his nerves. They don't have his favourite kind, but Steve guesses Bruce appreciates the gesture more than the actual tea, which he takes with a grateful nod.

Clint appears not long after with Thor in tow, squabbling good-naturedly about the latter's obsession with reality television. Unlike Bruce, Clint has fully embraced his so-called colour scheme, decked out in a purple shirt and an accompanying black suit, while Thor looks perfectly at ease in a classic black and white suit.

"I don't know what you did to the DVR, Thor, but all it keeps recording now are reruns of Say Yes to the Dress."

Natasha is the next one to arrive, sweeping into the room in a black knee-length dress with a lace neckline, her hair done up in some fancy style Steve doesn't recognize. She takes a seat beside Clint on the sofa when Thor shifts over to make room for her, leaning into him comfortably with a sigh.

Bruce looks over at her cautiously. "Do I even want to know many knives you've got hidden somewhere, Nat?" She gives a shrug in his direction at the question. "Don't need them, but it's always good to be prepared."

Her words are interrupted by a quick and familiar knock, and Tony enters a moment later. Tony has been away on a business trip for a little less than a week. Steve knows he's been preoccupied with SI business more than usual since the break-up with Pepper, wanting to take some of the pressure off her shoulders. Tony's sleepless nights are probably just as frequent as Steve's, nowadays.

Steve has missed his friend, but that's not what sends his heart jumping in his chest at the sight of Tony. He looks good, dressed in a dark grey-suit with his hair slicked back, eyes bright. He looks happy. Steve watches as Tony throws his head back, laughing loudly at one of Clint's quips, and finds himself wondering about the taste of Tony's laugh if Steve walked over and kissed him right now.

He pushes the thought away, but it lingers stubbornly. His imagination provides unhelpful suggestions about the way Tony's stubble would feel against his skin and how soft Tony's smile would be against Steve's, ignoring the reality where Tony is one of his closest friends who just went through a break-up, and who wouldn't look twice at Steve in that way even if he was ready for something new.

These thoughts aren't exactly new for Steve, ever since their first meeting. Still, it's the first time he's really thought about kissing Tony, and the thrill of excitement stirring in him catches Steve by surprise. Until recently, his attraction to Tony has been relatively easy to manage with the distraction of the team's growing pains and the fact of Tony's relationship with Pepper. Now evidently, it's starting to get out of hand.

It's not even really about how good Tony looks in a suit, even though the sight of him nearly takes Steve's breath away. He thinks Tony looks good in anything, from his old grease covered t-shirts to an oversized purple sweater that Rhodey apparently knitted for Tony one Christmas. He's worn it more than once to their weekly movie nights. Clint laughed so hard he almost fell off the couch the first time he saw it. Steve finds it adorable. It's just that Steve feels happy whenever he sees Tony smiling and happy like he is now, one arm slung around Bruce's shoulder as he bickers with Clint. He wants to be a part of Tony's happiness and to keep a little bit of it for himself. He wants Tony, all of him.

Steve's so screwed.

 

* * *

 

The first portion of the interview goes surprisingly well, despite Steve's fears. Tony puts his charm to good use, building a good rapport with the interviewer, which helps put the rest of the team at ease. Steve notices that he makes sure to involve the rest of them as much as he can, even though he gets the bulk of the questions. Though Steve can feel his smile getting tired and plastic at moments, the whole thing is going better than he imagined, and the proximity of Tony's presence next to him helps quiet his anxious thoughts. The worst of it is probably over.

That's why when the question comes Steve is completely caught off-guard.

"So, Captain America," The interviewer leans forward in his seat. Eddie, Steve remembers. His name is Eddie. "If you don't mind my asking, do you have any plans for romance?" There's a pause before he continues. "Or are you waiting for a certain special someone?"

Steve stiffens in his seat as the question registers. He knows it's not the first time a celebrity or a public figure has been asked by the media about their soulmates. A direct question is still considered a breach of etiquette, but the insinuation is clear. Next to him, Natasha's look turns dangerously pensive as she glances towards the interviewer and Steve can hear Bruce's breathing quicken in agitation.

Steve hunches forward, elbows braced on his knees "I'm -"

Tony interrupts him with a quick laugh, touching his hand to Steve's arm in a lightning-fast moment of reassurance. "Well, you can't ever really plan romance, can you? I'm sure Cap will start looking for love when he's good and ready." Tony's last words are pointed, and Steve sees the reporter start sheepishly.

The ride back to the Tower is mostly silent, and Steve spends it with his mind on one question: are you waiting for a certain special someone?

It's not a question he knows how to answer, really. There are moments when he thinks Tony could be his special someone, but that's just a daydream, and Steve can't deny that he still thinks of his soulmate, sometimes. Wonders where they are, what they're doing out there. If they're safe, if they're happy. His eyes linger on his left arm for a moment, remembering their words.

Once they're back at the Tower, Steve takes a quick shower and falls into bed right after, exhausted by the day's events.

 

* * *

 

Rain splatters on the floor-to-ceiling windows that cover one side of Steve's bedroom as he sits at his desk. He's working on a sketch, but the lines don't be to coming out right. It's one of Tony and Bruce, in the workshop. Steve had put a few lines down on paper last week in a flash of inspiration, one that has since stalled. A frown crosses his face as he presses down harder onto the drawing pad. Under the added pressure, the pencil snaps in one quick moment. Frustrated, Steve tosses the pad away from him. Sketching is one of the things he usually relies on to calm him down after a difficult mission, but even that has failed today.

A knock on the door interrupts his thoughts and Steve is torn between breathing a sigh of relief at a possible distraction and succumbing to the part of him that wants to be alone right now, away from everyone. Another knock follows the first, this time more insistent, and Steve relents.

Moving to the door, he pulls open the door to the sight of Tony standing there with his fist in mid-air, ready to knock again. He's dressed in an old MIT shirt and looks rather tired, but not so much that Steve would say he's been on another three-day workshop bender.

Tony smiles quietly when he sees Steve. "Hey, Cap - " The smile slowly slides off his face when he takes a closer look at Steve's expression, and Steve imagines he must look like a mess right now. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing. Did you need me for something?" Steve tries for a convincing smile, but it seems to come out more like a grimace, as the worry in Tony's eyes remains clear.

"I was just checking to see if you wanted to grab some dinner..." Without finishing his sentence, Tony steps forward and pushes past Steve through the doorway. He takes a seat on the edge of Steve's bed, hands folded in his lap.

"Look, I'm not good at talking about feelings, really, but you look like you need to talk right now, Steve. If it would help," he pauses and shrugs. "I can listen."

For a moment, Steve wants nothing more than to tell Tony to go away and mind his own business. It's nice that Tony's concerned, but he's fine, thank you very much. Then he looks at Tony, sitting there quietly, his eyes soft and careful watching Steve's face, and everything he's been thinking about since their last mission ended comes crashing onto his shoulders, and the weight is staggering.

Steve heaves a sigh and sits down next to Tony, his hands braced at his sides. "It's just... with this last mission, Doom almost had us. He managed to feed SHIELD the wrong information about his location, and we had no idea he was holding hostages." He runs a hand through his hair as Tony nods.

"We got lucky this time, Tony, and we got them all out. But what about next time? As much as I'd like to believe that we can save every person every time, we know that's not true. And the burden of making those kinds of decisions about the information we trust falls to me. What if next time it's not just being fed the wrong coordinates?" Steve's voice sounds ragged to his own ears, and he looks away from Tony, not wanting to see the look on his face. He knows he sounds weak, helpless. He had thought those days would be over once he had the serum, but he had felt that same helplessness when he was driving his plane into the ice, when he woke up in a completely new world, and now he's feeling it all again.

"What if next time it's a matter of choosing who to save? Or what if my decisions end up seriously endangering one of you? I don't know if I could -" Steve feels Tony's hand on his arm, a warm point of contact, pulling him back. When he looks up at Tony, his eyes are filled with understanding.

Tony clears his throat, leaning forward, his hand still on Steve's arm. "Gotta say, you've kind of caught me off-guard here, Steve." He makes a noise before Steve can interrupt. "I thought I was the only one being driven mad by these questions."

He follows this up with a half-laugh before breathing a sigh, rubbing the back of his neck with one hand. "I don't really have any right answers for you on this. It's true, you know. This business we're in, you, me, the rest of the team, it's not easy. Saving people might sound glamorous on paper, but they don't warn you about what happens when you don't save them." He looks away then, his eyes dark, and Steve thinks he might be remembering a specific loss.

"We can't save everyone. But, I do know two things." He looks at Steve with quiet steadiness, and Steve holds his gaze, transfixed.

"We can't let loss and the fear of loss keep us from trying. We can't save everyone, but every person we save, that makes a difference." Steve watches Tony's hands clench and unclench in his lap, and squashes the urge to reach over and cover them with his own. "There was a man, Yinsen. He was with me, in Afghanistan. He didn't make it."

"Tony," Steve swallows hard. "You don't have to -" To the best of Steve's knowledge, Tony hasn't said a word about his time in captivity to any of them since they became a team, and his words feel like both a privilege and an intrusion.

"He sacrificed himself so I could have more time, so I could get out. You know what he told me?" A bittersweet look crosses Tony's face at his next words. "He said, don't waste your life."

He turns back to Steve, shrugging. "So, that's what I've been trying, with SI and Iron Man, and now with the Avengers, the team. With you. I've been trying to make good use of my life. And at least I'm saving more people doing what I do now than what I did before. That's something, right?"

Tony shifts a little, nudging at Steve with his elbow, and Steve finds himself leaning into the touch, chasing it. "And the second thing. Steve, you gotta remember. You're not alone in this anymore."

"I know, Tony. Some days it just takes longer to remember." Steve looks at him with a small smile. This one feels real.

"Well, it's good you have me to remind you then, o Captain my Captain." Steve huffs at this, a little part of him stuck on the idea of Tony calling him "mine". "We're a team, and when you make a call in the field, we've got your back."

"We're stronger when we work together." A grin sneaks across Tony's face. Steve recognizes it as the one he wears when he's about to make a dumb joke and he knows it. "I mean, we do have a Hulk."

A small laugh bubbles out of Steve, and Tony's face brightens in victory. "That joke was pretty good, wasn't it?"

"I'm laughing, but only at how bad it was." Tony smiles unrepentantly in his direction, and in that moment, Steve feels so much less alone.

 

* * *

 

Steve finds that although he's more than used to having nightmares, some nights are always worse than others. For two nights in a row, he's been dreaming of the same horrors, of the people he has lost trapped under the ice, unmoving and lifeless as he screams and tries to claw his way to them. His Ma, Bucky, Peggy. On the third night, their faces turn into those of his team, and he jerks awake, mouth open in a silent scream, the image of Tony, unreachable and unresponsive, locked away in the ice imprinting itself in his mind. He tosses and turns for a while before giving up on the idea of more sleep and heading to the common room.

The room is dark, but the television is on at low volume, and Steve can make out Tony's outline through the doors leading out to the open balcony. Grateful for some company, especially Tony's after the nightmare he's just had, Steve goes to join him, crossing the room and pushing the balcony door open gently.

Tony doesn't turn at his arrival. Steve wonders if he would rather be alone, and is about to move away when Tony looks over his shoulder, sending a smile in Steve's direction that he returns immediately. Clad in an old tank top and sleep pants, Tony is far from the polished and put-together Tony Stark that the rest of the world gets to see. There are streaks of grease in his hair and he's clearly not slept for more than a day, and yet "beautiful" is the first word that springs to Steve's mind at the sight of him. This Tony is a softer, more intimate one that he rarely shows to anyone, and the idea that he is one of the few with such privilege sends a burst of golden warmth through Steve's veins. Tony is here, alive and real, not trapped under frost and ice far away from Steve, and he's beautiful.

"Looking for company, Steve?" Tony turns to fully face him as Steve walks closer to stand beside him, hands in his pockets. He looks up, his eyes full of bright concern. They both know everyone has their own ghosts on this team.

"Just, nightmares, insomnia." Steve gives a sigh that ends in a half-laugh, looking down at his feet. "The unadvertised perks of being an Avenger, yeah?" Months ago, thinking about his soulmate would have been good reason for another sleepless night, but Steve’s doing better with that now.

"Yeah, those do sneak up on you. Personally, I prefer the scrapes and bruises." They heal faster, he doesn't say, but Steve hears it anyway.

"What are you doing up, anyway, I thought you'd be down in the workshop tinkering on Clint's new bow?"

Tony chuckles, and Steve feels a small thrill at the sound. He loves the sound of Tony's laugh, not his practiced laugh that he performs so well, but his real laugh, the one Steve hears at breakfast whenever Clints starts giving voices to the characters on cereal boxes, or that time Nat got creative and gave Steve a red, white, and blue manicure. He's only ever heard Tony laugh like that around people he trusts. Steve wishes he could make Tony laugh like that every day.

"He gave DUM-E a rainbow paintball gun, which didn't work out well. So now the workshop's a mess and I'm not giving him his new bow for another week." Tony's still laughing though, and Steve bets that Clint won't have to wait that long for his new toy.

"So, you thought you'd come up here, do some stargazing?" Steve tilts his head upwards, gazing at the open sky. It's a gorgeous night, he can see why Tony's appreciating the view.

"Yeah, kinda. I, um," Tony pauses, rubbing a hand over the back of his neck. It's a nervous gesture that Steve recognizes, and he turns back to Tony with his full attention.

"I sometimes get nightmares about being swallowed by the dark, or being trapped in another wormhole after, you know," Tony waves his hand at the night stretching away in front of them "what happened, so when I have the time I like to come up here and look at it all spread out in front of me. I figure facing it head on might make things easier eventually."

Leave it to Tony Stark to go and handle his fear by charging straight at it, Steve thinks. He aches at the thought of Tony up here on this balcony all alone, loving and fearing the beauty of the stars at the same time, and he's doubly glad he found his way here tonight.

"Well, I think stargazing is better when you've got someone appreciating the view with you." Tony smiles at that, and Steve hopes he understands what Steve isn't saying. _You don't have to do this alone. I'm here._

A comfortable silence falls on both of them and Steve takes the time to properly soak in the view. An old memory comes to him, and he huffs out a startled laugh, breaking the quiet.

"You know, the last time I went stargazing was the night before they gave me the serum." Tony turns at this, eyes bright with interest.

"Really?"

"Yeah. I couldn't sleep at all that night, spent the time staring out the window and wondering if the serum would work, if it would really change my life like Erskine said it would." The stars are bright, and Steve remembers seeing them under the same sky, in a whole other century. "All I wished for then was a chance to fight for my country, like everyone else. Who would have thought I'd end up here?"

Tony makes a sound that is half-sigh and half-laugh. "It's not so bad, is it, Cap?"

"The people are pretty great, I guess." Steve pauses, considering. "If you'd asked me this when I first woke up I would have given you an entirely different answer, and I wouldn't have expected that answer to ever change. But now, it's better."

There are still hard days, and Steve knows there always will be. But he remembers what being happy feels like now, what belonging feels like, and the good days are starting to outweigh the bad. It's more than he could have had hoped for from the start. The rejection from his soulmate had been harder to take than he expected. Thinking of it had kept him up some nights, but now he has his team, and the parts of him he thought would stay empty have made space for new people.

"I know Erskine would have never predicted this. He told me, before the serum, that being a perfect soldier wasn't the most important thing. That I needed to stay a good man, as Captain America." Steve looks down at his feet. "I hope I've done that, at least."

When he looks up at Tony next, his expression is pained but determined. Steve darts forward instinctively, bracing one hand on Tony's shoulder. "Hey -"

"Steve, when I was a kid, I was never enough for Howard." Tony's statement hits Steve like a punch to the gut, cutting off what he had planned to say.

"He'd always describe you as this paragon of virtue and courage who could do no wrong, and I was just the kid who wanted too much attention and either did too much or too little. Nothing was ever enough for him." Tony's words are quiet and soft, for all that they're hitting Steve like bullets.

"I've made my peace with it now, but for a few years there I, ah, I hated you." Tony chokes out a sigh, and Steve hates the sound of it instantly. "I don't know what I expected when I went to see you, but it wasn't what I got."

"You're not the perfect hero Howard tried to make me believe Captain America was. You can be frustrating, annoying, reckless, but you're a good friend, a good leader, and above all, a good man. Never doubt that, Steve." Tony's last words are muffled into Steve's shoulder as he yanks Tony into a tight hug.

He holds on to Tony for dear life, his words sounding wrecked and broken as he whispers them into Tony's hair. "You are enough. I promise. For me, for the whole team, for the world. You're a hero, and you are enough."

Steve feels Tony shake a little in his arms at his admission, and holds on even tighter. There are more words he wants to say, but he keeps them close to himself. He doesn't know how Tony would react to them, or if they're too much. _I think you're amazing. You gave me a place to belong when I was feeling more lost than I ever thought possible. I am a better person for having met you._

The next thought that rises to the surface of his thoughts almost knocks Steve off his feet. _I'm in love with you._

 

* * *

 

In retrospect, blurting out "I think I'm in love with Tony" right in the middle of Clint and Natasha's debate on the most efficient way of getting information out of someone using only a fork during breakfast wasn't one of his brightest ideas.

Steve doesn't expect Clint to burst out laughing, his spoon falling into his cereal bowl with a heavy thunk. "Oh, wow. Finally caught on, have you. I didn't think you were going to announce it at breakfast, but at least you're not oblivious to it anymore."

He gapes at Clint, his mouth falling open. Sitting next to him, Bruce gives a deep sigh. "Clint…"

"What? I'm just saying, I thought Tony would figure it out before he did. I'm pretty sure Fury's figured it out, for god's sakes."

"You do gaze at Tony a lot during our debriefs, Steve. And you can't stop smiling whenever you make him laugh." Nat chimes in, biting into a blueberry muffin while tucking a loose strand of hair behind her ear.

Steve feels like his head is spinning a little. Stumbling into a nearby chair, he groans and cradles his head in his hands. "I don't -"

"I'm sorry to break it to you Steve, but you do." Thor gives a decisive nod, patting Steve sympathetically on the arm.

Steve drops his head on to the kitchen table with a loud groan. "So everyone knows?" The thought of being so blind to his own feelings has him flushing with embarrassment. Steve had known that he was open to the possibility of being something more than friends with Tony, but the idea of falling for him hadn't even crossed Steve's mind until last night, after it already happened. A part of him had thought he would never be ready to love again.

Bruce gives him a considering look. "If it helps, Tony doesn't yet."

"You two are basically like an old married couple who haven't figured out you're dating each other." Clint pushes his chair out, flinging his legs across Bruce's lap before inhaling another spoonful of cereal.

"Just because I have feelings for Tony, that doesn't mean he feels the same way." Steve knows Tony considers him one of his closest friends, but there's never be a hint of anything more from him, and why would there be? Tony is kind, generous, and so brilliant, he deserves someone equally amazing who inspires him and doesn't drag him down with reminders of past insecurities and doesn't burden him with their ghosts.

"Look, Steve, I get that you're scared. You don't have to do anything about your feelings if you don't want to. Falling for your best friend is a big deal. But don't hold back because you think he doesn't feel the same way, or he deserves better." Nat leans across the table, reaching for Steve's hand. "You make him happy. I think that's worth fighting for." Thor nods in agreement, as does Bruce, and Clint makes a sound into his cereal bowl that Steve assumes signifies agreement.

Bruce clears his throat. "What about your soulmate? Does part of you still want that? Because that's okay, Steve." His eyes are kind with understanding as Steve looks at him.

"I think a part of me will always remember them, remember the hope of finding them. But now I've found Tony and he's... he's everything. I'm sure about what I feel, and what my choice would be." Saying it out loud is liberating, like a weight has been lifted off his shoulders. He doesn't have to wonder about his soulmate now. He's found someone he loves, someone who makes him happy, and a detail like soulmates doesn't matter, because he will always choose Tony.

"Then isn't it worth the risk?" Nat asks gently.

Steve finds that he thinks it is.

 

* * *

 

"Planning a movie marathon?" Steve looks up from his spot on the couch at the sound of Tony's voice, smiling happily. He's been trying for weeks to work up the courage to ask Tony on a date, and he's chickened out every time. Even so, the possibility of spending time with him never fails to put a smile on Steve's face.

"No, but I'm up for it if you're game."

Tony drops down to the couch beside Steve with a sigh, folding his hands behind his head. "Wish I could, Steve, but I have Maria Stark Foundation's annual charity gala tonight, you know, the one I mentioned. Nat's going as well, as the Avengers' liaison." He grins. "I mean, technically I'm an Avengers' liaison too, but I'm attending on behalf of SI tonight, so I convinced her to come along."

"Oh." Steve feels a hot pang of disappointment in his stomach. Damnit, another missed opportunity. Then he's hit with a sudden strike of inspiration. "Have you found a date yet? If not, I could go with you." He smiles brightly in Tony's direction, hoping the eagerness in his tone isn't too obvious. This could be the perfect chance to spend a night with Tony at a date-like event before asking him out on a real date.

Tony laughs like Steve's just made a hilarious joke. "I wish you'd asked me earlier, Steve, I'm touched." Steve barely manages to hide his flinch. So not only did Tony miss Steve asking him out, the very idea of it seems laughable to him. Great.

"I got Jan to go with me, she's heavily involved in many of the projects overseen by the Maria Stark Foundation, and we're old friends so there won't be too much media speculation." Steve's met Janet Van Dyne a couple of times since the Avengers formed, mostly at social events. Each time she was nothing short of lovely. Sophisticated, gorgeous, and whip-smart; a perfect partner for Tony.

The pang of disappointment grows into something sharper, digging into Steve's chest until he can hardly breathe. He had been kidding himself, thinking that Tony might possibly return his feelings. Tony had laughed himself silly over the mere suggestion of Steve being his date to the gala.

Steve swallows hard, pushing past a lump in his throat. Without meeting Tony's eyes, Steve wishes him good luck, before standing up from the couch and leaving the room as fast as he can. If he is going to spend the rest of the evening pining over his best friend, he'd rather do it from the privacy of his own bedroom.

 

* * *

 

Tony returns to the Tower a few minutes before midnight. He's alone, a fact that both surprises and delights Steve, even if he feels a little guilty about it. He looks exhausted, his tie undone around his neck and his suit jacket slung over one arm. He visibly startles when he sees Steve camped out on the couch, in the middle of making his way through a pile of Agatha Christie mysteries.

"Thought you'd be asleep by now, Cap. Any chance you were waiting up?" Tony's voice is cheerful, if tired. He flops down on the couch next to Steve with an audible groan.

"Maybe. Did the gala go well?" Steve puts his book down and turns to Tony, acutely aware of the way their knees are almost touching as they sit side by side.

"Yeah, actually, it was great. Life-changing, in a way." Tony brushes a hand over his eyes, and Steve feels a pit of dread open up his stomach.

"Life-changing? You mean -"

Tony sits up and quirks a smile in Steve's direction. "Turns out Natasha and Jan are soulmates. They hit it off early in the evening when I introduced them to each other. I didn't get the details but apparently, Nat noticed that they both had the same words on their wrists, and well, the rest is history. The last I saw of them they were holding hands and sneaking away from the ballroom."

"Sounds crazy. Romantic, but crazy." Steve lets out a disbelieving laugh. He's really happy for Nat, who deserves all kinds of crazy happiness, and he's also happy his worries about Tony and Jan were unfounded. It's certainly a welcome change from his earlier mood.

"Yeah, it's the stuff everyone dreams of, right? My feet were starting to hurt from dancing, though." Tony leans his head back with a sigh, exposing the clean lines of his throat. Steve, fighting a blush, tries very hard not to imagine leaning over and kissing his way down Tony’s neck.

Latching on to the subject, he turns to Tony with a rueful laugh. "You know, I never really learned how to dance." The words are heavy on his tongue, weighed down with what-ifs and half-regrets. He's missed one date, and he doesn't want to waste a second chance. He just doesn't really know how to ask for one.

Removing his undone tie, Tony tosses it to one side before replying. "I had dancing lessons drilled into me as a kid. I got better at it, eventually." Tony sits up after a short pause, fidgeting with his hands.

"If, if you want, I could teach you sometime?" There is something shy and soft in Tony's voice as he asks the question, and Steve thinks that if he wasn't already in love with Tony, this moment would have tipped him right over the edge.

Images float into Steve's mind, of him placing a careful hand on Tony's shoulder, Tony's hand around his waist, moving in time to the music as Tony takes the lead, just like the way he had taken the lead with their friendship at first, helping Steve find his own rhythm in this new world. Talking in quiet whispers and making each other laugh, holding the other close. The thought warms Steve to his very core, and he thinks if he pressed a hand to his heart, it would skip a beat.

"I'd love that." It seems he's found the right partner, for dancing and romance.

 

* * *

 

Tony doesn't realize he's fallen back into his old habit of scribbling equations to help him focus until after it happens. He's avoided writing anything on his skin since that first message from his soulmate, not wanting to give into the temptation of writing back, also having no idea what to say to someone who stayed silent for decades, leaving Tony alone with his thoughts and his demons.

It was bound to happen sometime, he supposes, as muscle memory is hard to erase. Ignoring the sharp tug of panic inside him, Tony flips to his next hologram with a quick swipe. It's fine. His soulmate hasn't sent another message in months, there's no reason for them to break their silence now.

There's a clatter from the other end of the workshop, and Tony looks up to see Steve smiling sheepishly at him from his seat on the couch, sketchpad pushed to one side as he bends down to pick up his scattered coloured pencils.

"Sorry, I was just -" Steve's rubbing the back of his neck as he reorganizes his pencils, a nervous tick he probably picked up from Tony, which isn't surprising given how much time they spend together. Clint calls them inseparable, and Tony's well aware that Steve's now one of his closest friends, probably his closest friend next to Rhodey, which says a lot.

Becoming Steve Rogers' friend hadn't been something Tony had planned on after decades of Howard placing Captain America on a pedestal. He had recognized something in Steve on that first day, something lonely and dark. It was like a sharp pain had lodged itself in his chest, like gazing into an inverted mirror and seeing everything ugly and beautiful he felt inside of himself in someone's eyes. All he had wanted was to make Steve smile again.

Falling for him hadn't been part of the plan either, but realizing he was in love with Steve hadn't been a shock for Tony. It had felt like seeing the pieces of a complicated equation fall into place after nights of working through it, wondering why he hadn't figured it out sooner. Tony had ended up in the middle of it before he even knew he had started.

"Getting clumsy in your old age, are you, Rogers?" Chuckling, Tony minimizes the hologram with a quick motion of his hand before heading over to help Steve with the pencils. DUM-E's made his way over to Steve as well, and tries his best to help, dumping the red and blue pens on to Steve's lap with a clank.

Tony sees Steve rub an affectionate hand over DUM-E's arm in thanks and looks away, hiding a smile. Steve always takes pains to be polite to the bots, talking to them like friends the way Tony does. It's one of the things Tony loves the most about Steve, not that he'll ever say it to his face. He hadn't bothered denying his own feelings once he had worked them out, but he knows Steve very likely doesn't feel the same, and he won't risk the team and one of the most important friendships of his life over his stupid, foolish heart. Tony can handle it.

He sits down on the couch, retrieving the sketchpad and placing it in Steve's outstretched hand. There are only a few lines on the page, but Tony thinks he can make out the vague outline of the new Mark X armour.

A shocked, choked sound from Steve interrupts DUM-E's inquisitive whirring, and Tony looks up at him in alarm. The sketchpad has fallen from Steve's grip onto his lap, and Steve's staring at the equation in black ink on Tony's right wrist, eyes wide.

"Oh, that's just -" Tony fidgets, fighting the urge to tug the sleeve of his shirt down over the scribble. His words trail off when Steve shakes his head, rolling up his own sleeve and baring his right wrist to Tony's gaze. There's an equation scrawled on Steve's skin, the exact one that Tony knows is imprinted on his.

 _Oh my god,_ Tony thinks. _I'm in love with my soulmate._

 

* * *

 

Steve can't stop staring. He keeps his gaze fixed on Tony's wrist, not wanting to blink in case it changes, in case it turns out to be an elaborate lie or a very detailed dream. But the numbers on Tony's skin stay the same, the mirror image of the equation on Steve's skin.

Tony's his soulmate. Steve takes a deep breath, feeling a shout of delighted laughter building up in his chest threatening to break its way out. All the time, trying to put his soulmate in the past behind him, and he's been beside Steve all along, every step of the way into the future. He hasn't lost them.

Steve turns to Tony, reaching out for him and suddenly it feels like something precious has been snatched from him in one swift moment. Because Tony doesn't look happy. He looks shocked and upset, and Steve feels the double blow of rejection tear through him like a stab wound, clean through to the skin. For a moment, he'd thought… Now it's clear that his soulmate doesn't want him, that Tony doesn't want him. He could have lived with one of those things being true, but both of them being true seems laughably cruel. Steve feels his eyes prickle with unshed tears, and he quickly swipes a hand across his face, hoping Tony will let him get out of here before Steve loses it and breaks down in front of him.

"I'm sorry, I thought - I know that just because we're soulmates -" Steve's voice fractures as he tries to get his words out, and he takes a moment to steady his ragged breathing. "It's obvious you don't feel the same way I do, Tony. We can just forget about this soulmate thing and -" Steve's voice breaks again on the word soulmate, and he turns away, not wanting to see the look of pity on Tony's face.

"Wait, what? How you feel - Steve, how do you feel about me?" Tony's hand on his arm feels like a brand on an open wound, and a thread of anger begins to unravel in Steve's chest. Does Tony really have to drag this all out in the open? As if breaking Steve's heart isn't enough for one day.

"You know how I feel, Tony, everyone knows! I don't understand why you'd ask that when you clearly don't - for god's sake, what do you want from me?" Steve's vision blurs, and he wrenches his arm away from Tony's. For a moment he wants nothing more than to be far away from him, far away from the truth of Tony not wanting him. "Do you really want me to say it? Fine, I'll say it, but you better not regret it." Steve spits the words out, hating the way they curdle and turn bitter inside his mouth. Of all the ways he's imagined telling Tony, he never thought of something so painful.

"I'm in love with you." His anger burns out with his confession, and Steve's words come out like a plea, bottled up with months of yearning. "I'm sorry Tony, I know I shouldn't take this out on you, I never expected you to -"

"Oh, god." Tony's voice is thin and reedy, almost unrecognizable to Steve's ears. "You're in love with me?" His words carry an undertone of disbelief, and Steve opens his mouth to reply when Tony pulls him forward with a sharp tug and into a kiss.

Steve responds instantly, threading one hand through Tony's hair and placing one hand around Tony's waist to draw him closer. He's sprawled beneath Steve on the couch, warm, beautiful and everything Steve's ever wanted, and Steve doesn’t want to ever stop touching him. Tony's mouth falls open with a groan, and Steve licks hungrily into his mouth before kissing his way down to the curve of Tony’s shoulder.

"I thought, Steve, I thought -" Tony's voice sounds utterly wrecked to Steve's ears, and he suppresses a possessive thrill at the thought. He leans in again, this time kissing Tony full on the mouth for a long, blissful moment before breaking away. Tony lets out a whimper at the loss of contact, and Steve grins at the sound, pressing a soft kiss to Tony's forehead.

"Yeah, sweetheart?"

Tony's smile becomes incandescent at the endearment, and he snuggles closer to Steve, who responds by wrapping his arm around Tony.

"I didn't know. I thought you were just happy that you'd found your soulmate and I couldn't bear the idea of you wanting to be with me just for that. Seeing as I've been in love with you for months." He pauses. "I love you. God, that feels so good to say."

Steve lifts Tony's right wrist to his lips, pressing a quick kiss to the scribbled equation, delighting in his soul mate’s shiver at the touch. "I know exactly how you feel." He laughs, feeling the reassuring warmth of happiness throughout his whole body, like coming home after being lost for so long. "I can't believe we fell for each other without knowing we were soulmates. That's... amazing."

Tony huffs a laugh, dropping his head on to Steve's shoulder. "No wonder you didn't write back for so many years. I honestly thought I didn't have a soulmate, and then a message showed up out of nowhere. It was just after SHIELD found you, wasn't it?"

"When I first woke up your messages kept fading, they thought it was because of a time-delay from my time in the ice. The first one I got that didn’t disappear was a few days before we met." Steve frowns in concentration. "You wrote _D. needs an upgrade_... oh, you meant DUM-E!"

DUM-E, hearing his name, raises his arm hopefully, and Steve sends an affectionate glance in his direction. "We're good, thanks, buddy."

"I'm sorry I didn't answer -" Steve interrupts Tony's apology with a kiss before moving away with a soft smile.

"It's okay. I get it, it was a lot to take in, and you thought you had gotten decades of silent treatment from your soulmate. I wouldn't have known what to tell you even if you had written back. And I'm sorry you had to wait for so long."

This time, it's Tony who leans in for a kiss, one that Steve accepts graciously. "Hey, if I'm not allowed to apologize for being a jerk and ignoring you, you're not allowed to apologize for being trapped in ice for seventy years. I think that's a fair trade."

Tony breaks off, something uncertain creeping into his gaze, and Steve reaches for his hand, tangling their fingers together in a gesture of comfort. "Hey, what's wrong?"

"You know this isn't going to be easy, right, Steve? I love you, I do, so much, but just because we're soulmates doesn't mean everything's guaranteed to work out. And I can't, I can't lose you." His voice drops to a whisper, and Steve aches at the quiet fear in his words. "I don't want to ruin you."

"Sweetheart..." Stroking a hand through Tony's hair, Steve takes a moment to gather his thoughts before he speaks. He hates that Tony automatically assumes he's going to ruin Steve, ruin them, that Tony doesn't see how wonderful he is, and how Steve's a better man for knowing and loving him. He also knows Tony's right about the lack of a guarantee, despite the fact that they're soulmates. Steve needs to help Tony face his fear.

"Do you remember what you told me once? You said we can't save everyone, but that shouldn't stop us from trying to save every person we can, and that I'm not alone anymore. That's true now, too. We don't know if things are going to work out with us, but we'll never know unless we try, and what I do know is that I'll regret it forever if I don't give us a chance. You make me happy, Tony, and I don't want to lose that again, so I'll always fight for you." Steve hopes Tony feels the truth of what he's trying to say, feels how much Steve loves him with every word he hears.

"You're not alone in this. You have me, by your side, always. We'll fight and we'll argue, and we'll hurt each other, but I will love you through it all."

Tony gives a wet, wobbly laugh, and cradles Steve's face in his hands, pressing a feather-light kiss to the corner of his mouth. "Sounds a little like a vow, Steve."

"You got a problem with that, Stark?" Steve lets out a mock growl, tackling Tony to the couch. He wraps his arms around Tony, lowering his voice. "I think we're worth it."

Smiling, Tony pulls Steve in for a kiss. "I think we're worth it too."

 

* * *

 

The next morning, Steve is the first to wake. Glancing at a still-sleeping Tony beside him, a radiant smile makes its way across Steve's face. He reaches down to tangle their fingers together as Tony shifts on the bed, burrowing further into Steve's warmth with an unintelligible murmur.

They had spent hours tracing messages and kisses into each other's skin last night. The sight of _love you_ scrawled on the knuckles of his right hand leaves Steve glowing. Tony's left wrist is still bare though, and Steve gets to work. Five minutes later, he's finished his doodle of DUM-E holding a heart in his claw.

Tony's laugh is beautiful when he sees the doodle later, calling it the perfect upgrade, and Steve smiles in the sunlight as he leans in to steal a kiss.

**Author's Note:**

> Comments and kudos make me and DUM-E very happy :) 
> 
> feel free to message me on tumblr (@ishipallthings) to chat and/or cry over these idiots in love! 
> 
> I'll probably be writing more Steve/Tony this summer, so subscribe if you're into that :P


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